If you have gotten this far, you have seen the step by step restoration of a basically trashed X-Wing. Part 1 / Part 2 / Part 3 / Part 4

With the X-Wing back together and the wings seemingly holding, it was time to make new stickers! I made a replacement sheet using my secret ingredient list of 11 herbs and spices, and cut / applied them to the X-Wing using an Elmer’s glue stick. ** A little note here about repro stickers. I personally do not mind reproduction stickers. They are easy to make, look nice, and can be removed with water if you ever want to sell the object. However, I prefer that people print and make their own stickers at home, instead of buy them on eBay. At least that way, you aren’t supporting people who profit off of sticker reproductions, you are keeping it “in house.” OK – Off my soap box.

Looks pretty good I think! One thing that bothered me though was that this is supposed to be the battle damaged X-Wing. You can’t print the battle damage stickers on white paper – so what to do? Use ink-jet based water slide decal paper! I actually had some lying around from an old project, and rigged it to work with my “new” printer, and it worked like a charm!

I cut them out, soaked them in water, and applied them to the vehicle! The results were AWESOME!

And check it out- The wings WORK!

This restoration is DONE!!! Now, in the end, you may ask “was it worth it?” and my answer is a firm NO! I mean, it was “for me” because it gave me a lot of content for this blog, and I got to try out solvent welding. But lets add it up.

First of all – For a pure restoration, almost none of this would have been usable. The wing section was broken, the bottom of the main body was broken, the electrical didn’t work, and the R2 unit on top was essentially trashed. This would have been a “strip off the canopy and guns, and throw the rest in the trash” restoration. Honestly. Unless it was your own sentimental toy, this restoration to value ratio would have had you WAY underwater.

Right now you can get a nice loose vintage X-Wing on ebay for 50$, with original parts and stickers. Now, I HAD all the equipment and solvents to do this at no real cost outside of the X-Wing, but if I hadn’t: